Rep. Gus Bilirakis’s
2016 Report Card

These special statistics cover Bilirakis’s record during the 114th Congress (Jan 6, 2015-Jan 3, 2017) and compare him to other representatives also serving at the end of the session. Last updated on Aug 24, 2017. The statistics were updated on Jan 20, 2017 and Aug 24, 2017 to improve how we counted enacted laws. Originally published on Jan 7, 2017.

A higher or lower number below doesn’t necessarily make this legislator any better or worse, or more or less effective, than other Members of Congress. We present these statistics for you to understand the quantitative aspects of Bilirakis’s legislative career and make your own judgements based on what activities you think are important.

Keep in mind that there are many important aspects of being a legislator besides what can be measured, such as constituent services and performing oversight of the executive branch, which aren’t reflected here.

The Speaker of the House is not included in this statistic because according to current House rules, the Speaker of the House is not required to vote in “ordinary legislative proceedings, and the delegates from the five island territories and the District of Columbia are also not included because they were not elligible to vote in any roll call votes.

Laws Enacted

16th most bills
among
All Representatives; tied with 6 others

Bilirakis introduced 4 bills that became law, including via incorporation into other measures, in the 114th Congress. Keep in mind that it takes a law to repeal a law. Very few bills ever become law. View Enacted Bills »

The legislator must be the primary sponsor of the bill or joint resolution that was enacted or the primary sponsor of a bill or joint resolution for which at least about one third of its text was incorporated into another bill or joint resolution that was enacted as law, as determined by an automated analysis. While a legislator may lay claim to authoring other bills that became law, these cases are difficult for us to track quantitatively.

Writing Bipartisan Bills

18th most bills
among
All Representatives; tied with 2 others

In this era of partisanship, it is encouraging to see Members of Congress working across the aisle. 17 of Bilirakis’s 27 bills and resolutions had both a Democratic cosponsor and a Republican cosponsor in the 114th Congress.

Ideology Score

37th most conservative
among
Serving 10+ Years

Our unique ideology analysis assigns a score to Members of Congress according
to their legislative behavior by how similar the pattern of bills and resolutions they cosponsor are to other Members of Congress.

For more, see our methodology. Note that because on this page only legislative activity in the 114th Congress is considered, the ideology score here may differ from Bilirakis’s score elsewhere on GovTrack.

Powerful Cosponsors

43rd most bills
among
All Representatives; tied with 8 others

8 of Bilirakis’s bills and resolutions in the 114th Congress had a cosponsor who was a chair or ranking member of a committee that the bill was referred to. Getting support from committee leaders on relevant committees is a crucial step in moving legislation forward.

Leadership Score

52nd best score
among
All Representatives

Our unique leadership analysis looks at who is cosponsoring whose bills. A higher score
shows a greater ability to get cosponsors on bills.

For more, see our methodology. Note that because on this page only legislative activity in the 114th Congress is considered, the leadership score here may differ from Bilirakis’s score elsewhere on GovTrack.

Joining Bipartisan Bills

60th most bipartisan
among
House Republicans

In this era of partisanship, it is encouraging to see Members of Congress working across the aisle. Of the 267 bills that Bilirakis cosponsored, 17% were introduced by a legislator who was not a Republican.
View Cosponsored Bills »

Only Democratic and Republican Members of Congress who cosponsored more than 10 bills and resolutions are included in this statistic.

Cosponsors

76th most cosponsors
among
All Representatives

Bilirakis’s bills and resolutions had 528 cosponsors in the 114th Congress. Securing cosponsors is an important part of getting support for a bill, although having more cosponsors does not always mean a bill will get a vote. View Bills »

Committee Positions

Bilirakis held a leadership position on 0
committees and 0
subcommittees, as either a chair (majority party) or ranking member (minority party), at the end of the session. For comparison to other Members of Congress, we assigned a score giving five points for each full committee leadership position and one point for each subcommittee leadership position. View Bilirakis’s Profile »

Working with the Senate

The House and Senate often work on the same issue simultaneously by introducing companion bills in each chamber. 1 of Bilirakis’s bills and resolutions had a companion bill in the Senate. Working with a sponsor in the other chamber makes a bill more likely to be passed by both the House and Senate.

Companion bills are those that are identified as “identical” by Congress’s Congressional Research Service.

Government Transparency

GovTrack looked at whether Bilirakis supported any of 40 government transparency bills in the House that we identified in this session. We gave Bilirakis 0 points, based on one point for cosponsoring and three points for sponsoring any of these bills.

Additional Notes

The Speaker’s Votes: Missed votes are not computed for the Speaker of the House. According to current House rules, the Speaker of the House is not required to vote in “ordinary legislative proceedings.” In practice this means the Speaker of the House rarely votes but is not considered absent.

Leadership/Ideology: The leadership and ideology scores are not displayed for Members of Congress who introduced fewer than 10 bills, or, for ideology, for Members of Congress that have a low leadership score, as there is usually not enough data in these cases to compute reliable leadership and ideology statistics.

Ranking Members (RkMembs): The chair of a committee is always selected from the political party that holds the most seats in the chamber, called the “majority party”. The “ranking member” (sometimes “RkMembs”) is the title given to the senior-most member of the committee not in the majority party.

Freshmen/Sophomores: Freshmen and sophomores are Members of Congress whose first term (in the same chamber at the end of the 114th Congress) was the 114th Congress (freshmen) or 113th (sophomores). Members of Congress who took office within the last few months of a Congress are considered freshmen in the next Congress as well.